Obsessed
by Ochiba Konpeki
Summary: Sanity is a fragile thing. And so many ways to break it-obsession, pyromania, being raped, having a look-alike, sharing a bedroom with your rival... Falling in-being pushed into-love. Or hate, whatever this is. Kyman, 'Tophlovski.
1. Candid

**Obsession**

_I clung tightly to my mother's skirt, an automatic smirk curving my lips as I surveyed the children around me whom, at the tender age of four, I had already labeled as worthless, useless Neanderthals. A kind looking man-the teacher-is busy reassuring my hysterical mother that I would be fine._

_Looking back, my mom's fit was my very first impression to my entire social circle for the next fourteen years of my pathetic life. Classes don't really change in small towns. I wonder if many people, around fourth grade when it started to get clear, remembered my mother's hysteria and related it back to my... Let's use the word eccentricity._

_I actually recognize one of the boys and wander over to him, away from my panicked parental unit stressing about me being taken from her like my father was. When I reach him, I can't help but notice his hair, wild, long, curly and genuinely red. It almost didn't look natural and I told him as much. "You look stupid." was the very first thing out of my mouth. He whipped around, bright green eyes flashing with anger, and I was officially introduced to Kyle's razorblade tongue for the first time._

_He better not think I didn't notice his obsession with keeping his hair hidden after that, however. How I would regret that insult when I wanted nothing more than to peek at those wild locks, hidden by a ushanka that, thanks to hellish this everlasting winter, was never temperature-improper._

OoO

Obsession is not a word to use lightly.

It implies danger, madness, negativity. Obsessions absorb time, energy, and sanity relentlessly. Obsessions are addictive.

Actually, let's focus on that analogy for a moment. You trade an addiction for an addiction, yeah? You substitute obsession for obsession.

That's why I'm here. To forget _him. _

If only for a moment.

OoO

_Do you remember those two little boys in kindergarten, first, and second who seemed to be forever fluctuating between playing nicely and rolling around on the floor, throwing childlike punches, kicking, biting and spilling forth words no little boy should know but inevitably learn from their elders?_

_That was Kyle and I._

_We became notorious for it, our little group. Stan, faithfully standing up for his fiery best friend. Kenny, there more for comedic relief and mediation. Kyle, who loved all of us except for me. And me, Eric. The ignorant bully who was kept around for perhaps the sole reasoning that all little boys love crude humor and a good fight._

_Everyone loved our fights, verbal or physical. What I enjoyed more were our unspoken games, the challenges and silent competition for grades, popularity, dominance, bragging rights, et cetera. I think our private war was mostly just about winning. About beating each other._

OoO

I finished hosing off the ground, watching the gasoline-tainted water wash down the drain, cleansing the cool concrete of the basement. Slowly, I look up at The Box sitting in the corner. The Box that needs to burn. I can't burn it, though, not yet. Not until I can forget him.

What's in the box, you ask? Things. Things, the kind of things you collect over eleven years-make that twelve, actually-of knowing your rival/friend thing. I have clothes, I have one of his stupid ushankas, I have old schoolwork, books of his, a stolen journal from seventh grade, even a used insulin needle. I know I'm fucked up, don't look at me like that.

I also have pictures. Lots and lots of candid pictures, taken discreetly with phones, through his windows, et cetera. Hey, at least I stopped breaking into his room at night.

Despairingly, I sighed, dragging an old ripped sheet tied and stuffed with debris into the middle of the room, making sure the water was still on in case something went wrong. My heart began to pound, my breath coming in pants as the silent room was filled with the smell of gasoline, sharp and strong enough to make me feel giddy as I unscrewed the cap to the container. I doused the poison over the debris liberally, feeling my breath hitch in my throat as I reached for a lighter, my favorite, the lime green one I modified last month.

I rubbed my thumb across the top, satisfied to feel the slick liquid still seeping slowly from the tiny flame thrower. Giggling anxiously, I stepped forward to crouch down near a long puddle of gasoline that I'm pretty sure would be enough to light the whole thing up.

OoO

_It was fifth grade that my obsession really began._

_It was almost subconscious at first. I hardly even noticed how I started to refer to him-usually mentally-as mine, as being longing to me. It didn't faze me when it occurred to me how beautiful he was when he was flushed with anger and how sometimes, especially when he was reading or sleeping in class or on the rare occasions a substitute made him take off that damned hat, I really wanted to touch him, his hair, his face._

_It wasn't until seventh grade that I came to the conclusion that I wanted so very badly to own Kyle Broflovski._

OoO

Carelessly, I swiped my thumb across the switch, my heart skipping a beat in my excitement as flame exploded violently from the lighter like a miniature flame thrower, instantly sending the gasoline aflame. The pile of abandoned wood, cardboard, paper, cloth and trash burst into a bright flame that radiated heat, licking at my already hot face and making me shudder, giggling maniacally. I backed a safe distance away, watching my creation, my precious artwork fill the room with rancid smoke and firelight.

As it became hard to see I took in a large, poisonous lungful of air as a mildly sadistic smirk overtook my face. I could feel my eyes glaze over as I slumped against the wall behind me, eyes fixed on the bright flames licking at everything flammable that it could reach. I have no doubts in my mind that my love would gladly burn me up.

For some reason, that excited me.

OoO

_Middle school is a harrowing time of hormones and the first taste of drama and forbidden fruit._

_It's when girls develop curves and a vague knowledge if the power behind them, the time that boys learn how to be respectful in their admiration-or learn how to take a slap to the face like a man._

_It was also when other people started to notice how beautiful he is._

_It was mostly girls-from cheerleader types to the bookworms he studied with after school-, but there were a couple guys as well, comfortable in this new age of acceptance. Kyle didn't really notice-or if he did, he was good at pretending he didn't._

_That's when the jealousy was born._

_It burned hot in my chest, made me feel sick and lightheaded with anger and possessiveness. It clutched at my sanity and drove me farther into my fights with him. I made crude comments, combated him over every little thing, called him horrible things, anything to keep his attention on me and off of everyone else._

_It didn't help that Butters was so starry eyed for him. He was so clingy, worse than any of the pin-up dolls fluttering their eyelashes at my Jew._

_Because of how popular he was with the girls (with his dazzling smile and politely kind nature (when he wasn't fighting with me, anyway)), and probably because he's pretty effeminate, he also attracted a lot of bullies._

_Seventh grade was the first time I ever beat somebody up in his defense. I don't think he ever heard about it._

_Eighth grade was the first time I snuck into his room to watch him sleep and snoop about his room._

_I was obsessed. It was-is-terrifying._

_He hated me so much._

OoO

I forgot about _him_ at first, but after what could've been mere moments or dragging hours, I caught myself thinking that the fire reminded me of his personality, so passionate and destructive yet so hauntingly beautiful.

_'That's counterproductive,'_ I scolded myself mentally, brain quite foggy, almost as foggy as the air around me. Hot-boxing a gasoline fire, in retrospect, was not a good idea. I almost felt high, high enough that I thought it a brilliant idea to throw my bag of weed into the flame to add to the hypnotic aura of the room. I didn't notice a difference, but I could hardly breath, leave alone think. Using all my energy, I forcefully pushed all thoughts of_ him _from my mind and focused on the oddly distant flames growing and roaring and destroying whatever their fiery fingers could clutch at. Hazily, I tossed my box of matches in to help the flames, before realizing belatedly that the gesture was pointless.

My anger, my hate, my frustration melted, the wax emotion melting as I flew too close to the sun, so self assured that I was blinded by my fantasm invincibility.

But _he _had no place in my mind and for that I was grateful.

It didn't take long for the limited air to cut off enough oxygen to my brain that I passed out, slumped like a broken toy against the wall.

OoO

_Today, we had a fight. Like every other day. I can't even remember what it was about. But it kept escalating and escalating until I snapped and screamed, "You filthy no-good son of bitch_ kike_!" _

_He was having a bad day. I already knew that. I know everything about him, after all, and I should've known he couldn't handle being pushed when he's upset._

_But the last thing I expected was for him to burst into tears in the middle of a crowded school hallway, surrounded by awed students who count watching us fight as a hobby._

_"Why the fuck are we fighting?" he gasped out between sobs, unashamed of the tears pouring from his pretty green eyes. I stumbled back, startled, completely without an answer. He clenched his eyes shut and fisted his hands tightly, screaming, "Why, Eric? What did I do to deserve your hate? Tell me! I... I can f-fix it!"_

_He's always loved to fix things._

_I ran out of the school, thoughts tumbling over themselves. I needed fire. I needed to forget._

OoO

When I woke, I was miserable. The room was cold and I felt numb in the darkness left over from the lack of fire. Charred debris and ash covered the 'fire pit'. My throat felt like it was on fire and my lungs protested every gasping breath of poisonous, sooty air. Worst of all, though, worst of all is that the first thing I was conscious of thinking about were his pretty green eyes.

I wondered if either of my dangerous obsessions would kill me if I asked nicely.

In the end, that passive thought was my downfall.

OoO

_Hiya y'all. I'm at Duke Young Writer's and I wrote this for Multi-Genre writing. I think it scared Ms. Kiser a little. I MIGHT be inclined to continue it. Might. Reviews are encouraging, of course..._

_Henry, Ash-If you're reading this I am going to kill you._

_QUESTION! How many readers are-or were, I guess-DYWC campers?_

_**QUESTIONS, COMMENTS, CONCERNS? REVIEW!**_


	2. Melt

_So as it would turn out, I'm not dead! Anyway, I just went through a bit of a rough time, and now I'm banned from speaking to my best friend, but I finally found some inspiration... I told you I eventually come around to writing what I promise I'll write!_

**Obsession-Melt**

_I didn't mean it. I swear to God, I didn't mean it, I never meant it. I never wanted this to happen..._

Mom dutifully turned a blind eye to my pyromania. And the way I screamed in my sleep. And the burn marks that covered my hands and made writing difficult. She should've known better than to come down into the basement.

I don't blame her, really. I think that if I saw my child standing before his second large fire of the day, pouring gasoline over his head and laughing, choking on smoke, I would react the same way.

She screamed and I jerked back, away from the fire, spinning around to meet her gaze, wiping at the gasoline near my eyes. She choked on a sob and collapsed.

For a moment I just stared, the severity of the situation not quite setting in. I watched the thick smoke billow into the house, watched my mother's chest heave as she convulsed, watched the fire melt my shoes to the ground, the soles slowly loosing their shape an fusing to the concrete as my feet burned.

Oh god.

The fire.

It was spreading.

Finally, I screamed, struggling out of my stuck-to-the-concrete shoes and rushing over to my painfully still mother, picking her up roughly and hightailing it up the stairs, into my smoke-filled kitchen. Sirens wailed up the streets as I struggled to remember my way through the house, struggled to get past the oxygen deprivation and the sirens echoing in my brain.

In the end I couldn't. I collapsed against the wall in the hallway, my mother cradled in my arms, and everything went black, black and silent like the poison slipping through the air.

OoO

I woke to a steady beeping filling the room, my head throbbing in time with each splitting ring.

I moaned a little pitifully, crying out as I struggled to open my eyes, blinded by the light. A moment later, a soft voice called my name. "Cartman? ... ... You awake?"

I slitted my eyes open, vaguely taking in a beautiful face framed by luxurious wine curls, emerald eyes sparkling with worry. "Angel?" I muttered confusedly, reaching up to touch it's face. It laughed a little nervously. "Cartman, it's me, Kyle. You okay?"

"Kyle?" I murmured confusedly. I knew that name. It was familiar. And dangerous. Like fire.

I sat bolt upright, eyes wide and fearful, every exhausted muscle in my body tensed. "Mom!" I called out, wincing at how pathetic my own voice was, small and scared and desperate. Kyle grabbed my hand and I looked at him, hating the pity shining in those beautiful eyes of his.

"Your mother is going to be just fine, Cartman, don't worry." he soothed, looking towards the door like he might call for a nurse at any moment. I snarled at him, yanking my hand away and jostling the IV there. Angrily, I stared at the needle, my fury rising. I hate needles. "Where is she?" I demanded. Kyle flinched back, glancing guilty up at the ceiling. "_Where is she?_"

"She's not here, Cartman, lay back d-"

"Like hell she's not here!" I growled, yanking out the IV and standing on weak legs, suddenly aware that I was wearing a hospital gown. I started for the door, taking each step as fast as I could and stumbling, and in a panic Kyle cried out as my monitor 'flatlined', calling out for help.

The door, just inches from my fingers, was flung open and an older woman grabbed my wrist, fumbling just a moment on something in her hand before a needle was plunged into my forearm, and everything went dizzy again as the needle withdrew, leaving a small trail of blood. I shouted my anger in slurs as my vision closed in on itself and I slumped heavily to the floor.

OoO

The next time I woke up, I was calm. Kenny was there, curled up next to my legs asleep, like a guard dog. I smiled. Everything seemed so warm and fuzzy. Fuzzy fuzzy fuzzy. "Kenny..." I whispered, grinning maniacally at his slowly stirring orange form. "You awake?"

The young man sat up and stretched, murmuring in a voice still half asleep, "M'wake."

"_Kenny_..." I drawled out his name, "Kenny, everything is okay now, _Kenny_..."

He snorted, turning bright blue eyes on me. It didn't even occur to me to be worried by the deep exhaustion bruises under his eyes. "Whatever they have you on, dude, I want some."

I giggled, trying to reach out to him to give him a hug. He looked cuddly. Like a bunny. "What happened, Kenny?" I asked contently a moment after giving up on hugging him. He glanced at the clock and I looked over too, squinting to try and see the numbers. Three sixty two AM. Or was it three twenty six AM? I couldn't bring myself to care all too much.

"You set a fire." Kenny muttered slowly, fixing his eyes on his hands. "You set a fire and your mother saw you, and it, and something about you dying, and something in her just... Snapped."

I knew I should be worried but the feeling was hard to hold onto. I smiled. "Where is she?"

"... Denver."

"... Why?"

"There are no Mental Hospitals in South Park."

We stared at each other, my face twisted into an empty smile and his the picture of sympathy. "Oh."

Silence reigned for several long moments. Kenny offered me a weak smile. "Why don't you try and go back to sleep, okay buddy?"

"... Kay."

And sleep was easy to come by.

OoO

I'm being released today. They say I'm mentally stable and that my lungs have cleared out most of the damaging smoke. I don't know where I'm going to go. Apparently, my house is structurally unsound due to an explosion from when the fire hit a gas pipe, but the damage was apparently, "Not as bad as it could've been." It's still standing, anyway.

It's not like I can stay at the mental hospital in Denver with mom either. She's not even allowed visitors yet, let alone dependents.

Where am I going to go?

OoO

"Mom, you can't... _Mom! _This is totally unfair!" I whined, stomping my foot and crossing my arms over my chest. Maybe I was acting like a child, maybe I was being insensitive, but goddammit, can you really blame me? She was signing papers giving her _custody of Eric T. Cartman _until his mother is better!

"Now, Bubbe," she soothed, "The Cartman's are going through a hard time and we need to be supportive of them despite how Eric has treated us in the past."

"Plus we flipped a coin and lost."

"Gerald!"

"Where is he going to sleep?" I demanded.

They looked at me. I looked back at them.

"God_dam_mit."

"Language, Bubbe!"

OoO

There's been an extra bed in Kyle's room for four years, since we were twelve, when Kenny's parents got shipped off to rehab by the state. Stan occupies it roughly half the time, Kenny the other half of the time. Despite the fact that it makes his room seem crowded and hard to navigate, he decided to keep it in case someone needed it. I doubt he ever thought that someone would be me.

I've always liked Kyle's room. The walls are a peaceful light gray, and the ceiling is a collage of dry erase boards he'd found here and there. They're covered in doodles and scribbles, mostly from Stan and Kenny and Ike, and there's a light blue board directly above his bed where he writes a to-do list every night so that the first thing he sees in the morning is a reminder of everything he needs to do that day. At the moment, it says, _"Cartman gets out of the hospital today." _and nothing else.

The room is dominated by the two twin beds, one directly under the window on the far wall from the door-Kyle's-, the other one pressed against the consecutive wall, fitting so that the headboard pressed against the side of Kyle's bed and the other side pressed against the wall, forming an L-shape. At the foot of Kyle's bed, against the wall is an impressive six-foot tall oak bookshelf stuffed with books. The fourth wall was occupied by the door to Kyle's closet and a small oak dresser with a chalkboard sitting on it.

I like the chalkboard. Kyle writes a line from whatever song is stuck in his head that day on it. Today, it read, _"'Cause nothing stays the same-Maybe it's time to change."-Maybe, Sick Puppies._

I stood from the bed-my bed, now-and walked over to the board, wiping away the words and writing in their place, _"Tiefe Brunnen muss man graben, wenn man klares Wasser will, Rosenrot oh Rosenrot, Tiefe Wasser sind nicht still."-Rosenrot, Rammstein._

I felt a little more at home.

OoO

If Kyle noticed that I changed his board, he didn't comment. If Kyle didn't like that I was there, he didn't say anything.

We sat in silence. I leaned against the wall and he sat up in the middle of his bed, bent over a little composition notebook, scribbling away.

Suddenly, it struck me that I've been in the hospital for a week and a half. "School is over." I noted out of nowhere, a bit of surprise leaking into my tone. I would be an Junior next year. Slowly, Kyle looked up. "Yeah." he muttered. "You've been excused from the last couple assignments. You're lucky you already took all the final exams."

"Lucky." I echoed. He winced. "Sorry."

"Whatever, Jew."

His eyes shot up to mine. "Fuck you, Cartman. We took you in and we're taking care of you for as long as your mother can't. Show some goddamn respect or I'll beat it into you."

For a moment, that familiar anger flared up in my chest, but like worry for my mother that night with Kenny, it was hard to hold onto and quickly trickled from my grasp. I sighed tiredly, fixing my eyes on my hands. "Whatever." I murmured noncommittally.

Eager to change the subject, Kyle looked over at the clock and then to me. "It's kind of getting late and you've had a long day. Do you... Wanna borrow some pajamas and go to bed?"

I stared at him a moment, a smirk rising on my face as he stared back, cheeks coloring.

I had lost a lot of weight. I allow myself to be proud of that despite that I lost the majority of it through an anorexia issue I had from the time I was thirteen to about a year and a half ago. I'm more proud that I've kept myself within a good range and that beneath the little layer of fat covering my body, there was some serious muscle. Despite this, I was still twice Kyle's size easily, towering a good foot over him at six foot two, and twice his weight-literally. He's around eighty five pounds and I'm just under two hundred.

"So that won't work." he sarcastically bit out. "I don't think I realized that you don't have any clothes until just now."

I wilted a bit. I couldn't help it. I had literally nothing-the shoes on my feet were a pair I'd left at Kenny's and the clothes on my back still smelled of smoke from the fire and gasoline despite the fact that the hospital had washed them. I was wearing all my worldly possessions at that moment.

"I'll figure it out." I asserted. Kyle rolled his eyes. "Mom will figure it out." he corrected truthfully. I wondered how I would pay them back, hoping they wouldn't make me do yard work.

I sighed again, standing and starting to pull off my shirt. "What are you doing?" Kyle asked sharply as I tossed the gas stained shirt down beside the bed. I turned and grinned cockily at him, enjoying the blush spreading across his cheeks as he alternated between looking at my face and his hands.

"Getting ready for bed."

His expression turned absolutely mortified and I really laughed for the first time since the fire. "Please tell me you don't sleep naked." he begged, and I laughed again as I unashamedly started to undo my equally smoke and gas stained jeans, kicking off my shoes as I did so. "No, boxers." I murmured, letting him off the hook as I shimmied out of the denim, kicking them over to rest by my shirt. His cheeks were bright red.

"Like what you see?"

"Nudity freaks me the fuck out dude, just get under the covers." he demanded, not looking up from his lap. I looked down in confusion. "I'm not naked."

Kyle, eyes fixed on his feet, stood and walked over to the dresser, digging around and eventually pulling out one of Stan's old jerseys and a pair of Terrance and Philip patterned sleep pants. "Just stop it." he groaned as he left the room to change.

I stared after him. I thought I knew everything about the Jew, but apparently not.

I'd be learning a lot about Kyle, I'd soon find out. A lot.

_**QUESTIONS, COMMENTS, CONCERNS? REVIEW!**_


	3. Pills and Needles

_So here it is, the third chapter to Obsessed, and while this particular section is dedicated to fleshing out Kyle and kind of setting the stage, I enjoyed writing it, especially because it sets Kyle as __less of a perfect person, like one might be lead to believe by the first chapter and Eric's obsession, and more as a melodramatic, troubled teenaged South __Parkian. The title is a pun-Pins and Needles? Pills and Needles? Roflmao!_

**Pills and Needles**

A moment after Kyle left, I slipped under the covers and turned towards the wall, deciding to just pretend to be asleep.

Soft footstep heralded his return, soft footsteps and the gentle swish of fabric. The floor creaked when most people walked across it, but the damn Jew was eerily silent. His bed creaked back and forth a bit and I heard the squeak of a marker against the boards, indicating that Kyle was writing his stupid, obsessive to-do list. Then I heard his feet hit the floor and the rustle of paper-I figured he was rifling through a notebook of some sort. A moment later I heard a beep announcing that his blood sugar had been read. He sighed.

He stepped closer to my bed and I casually shifted my forearm over my eyes so the movement under the lids wouldn't tip him off that I'm awake and, to make it convincing, I let my lips part relaxedly. I felt his weight against the mattress as he leaned over me, and, in some sort of episode of maternal instinct, pulled the covers up farther around my shoulders, causing me to have to actively fight back a smirk and a blush. It felt good to be on the receiving end of his gentle side, even if it was... Unfamiliar. I started to think that maybe these arrangements could be to my advantage.

"Sleep well, Cartman... Eric." he murmured softly, gliding away. The lights flicked off.

Even though I was tired, exhausted even, mentally, emotionally and physically, sleep refused to come. Kyle had a small reading light casting his distorted shadow across the ceiling and the rustle of the pages of whatever he was absorbed in, while somewhat soothing, was making me antsy. Silence and darkness, that's my motto when it comes to sleep.

It could've been hours, or a few minutes, or forever. I had no way of telling time. But eventually, I heard him singing, too softly for me to hear the words but loud enough that I could appreciate the soothing melody.

When he stopped, he stopped abruptly, as though he had been firmly told to shut up, and promptly turned out the light and, judging by the sigh of the mattress, laid down.

He shuffled. God, I was _tired_, couldn't he just lay still? He messed with the sheets. He sighed. It was quiet for a moment. He turned over.

"Kyle."

He yelped, and a frantic shuffling was heard before his head popped over my headboard, his emerald eyes decidedly childlike and apologetic in the moonlight.

Absently tracing a thumb under the shadows that had been under his eyes since he was a toddler, he whispered guiltily in a voice meant for late night conversations, "Sorry. Insomniac."

I groaned. "Goddamn Jew can't do anything right... What makes you sleep?"

"... The rain." I'd been expecting sarcasm, not this quiet honesty. I sighed, looking away from his dangling red curls, shining ever so softly in the moonlight. "And Stan." he tacked on after a moment.

"Fag." I muttered.

"Fatass." he muttered back, disappearing back to his own bed, where he laid down with an angry huff. Not to be outdone, I huffed too, turning on my side and pouting into the dark. I felt so restless... And I wanted to light a fire...

In the end, it was fire that put me to sleep, and fire that haunted my dreams in vague little terrors that escaped me when my eyes shot open again and again. Sometimes Kyle's breathing would be slow and even and asleep and I took comfort in that-other times he was awake and asked me worriedly if I was okay.

I didn't say anything.

OoO

It was early the next morning when I gave up on sleeping, but apparently I got a good couple of hours in because when I woke for the last time, my obnoxiously OCD roommate was scribbling on his chalkboard, fully dressed and wine curls dripping wet, soaking the back of his shirt. It looked like all his attention was focused on that one little thing and it made my stomach burn with jealousy. I wanted his attention. All of it.

Always.

"What kind of sucky music did you pick today?" I yawned as I sat up, my head throbbing in time. He shot me a glare out of the corner of his eye and snapped coldly, "Don't even _look_ at me before I take my meds, you worthless egocentric _lummox_."

I blinked. "I can respect that, Jewboy." I relented quickly, more quickly than I'd usually let something go. I was really having a hard time holding on to... Anything, really. As if on cue, the ginger's bitch of a mother knocked on the door and, without waiting for a response, pushed it open. In her hand was a small tray that she wordlessly placed on Kyle's dresser, apparently a faithful abider of the no-talking-to-Kyle rule. I stood curiously and moved to look at the contents as Kyle stared blankly at the words he'd written.

Glucometer, coffee, insulin needle, small blue pill, two small brown capsules, a handful of what appeared to be different kinds of chewable vitamins, and finally, a small white plastic lid filled with a white powder.

I blinked. Damn. I knew Kyle was sickly, but _damn._

The redhead-seemingly mass of dark energy this morning-stalked over to me and monotonously explained, "The blue pill is my anti-depressant, the brown ones are iron supplements, the vitamins are for vitamin D, vitamin C and calcium, which I'm not getting enough off, and the pink one is just a genetic multivitamin I've been taking since I turned thirteen. The white stuff is a light laxative to counteract what the iron does to the system."

Without another word, he poured the powder into the coffee, taking a spoon and stirring it meticulously until only a little of it remained visible, floating across the top, before placing the antis and the iron on his tongue and swallowing it down with a swig of the bitter, albeit pleasantly fragrant, beverage. Carelessly, he popped all four vitamins and chewed them reluctantly, a grimace stuck on his face. He downed the rest of his coffee, shook his head, took a deep breath, then pressed the tip of his glucometer to the tip of is left ring finger-the one with the eternal scab-and popped the digit in his mouth as he waited for his blood sugar to register. I didn't catch the number-and I wouldn't know what it meant-but he winced and picked up the needle.

Turning a little green, I stepped away and turned around. Kyle chuckled humorlessly and a moment later the needle clattered back onto the tray.

"All that goddamn medication," he grumbled, "_'You're underweight, Kyle.', 'You're diabetic, Kyle.', 'You're anemic, Kyle.', 'You're depressed, Kyle.', 'You're of ill health, Kyle.', 'You're an insomniac, Kyle.', 'You have anxiety issues, Kyle.', 'You're Jewish, Kyle!'_"

I have no idea what that last one had to do with anything but I let it go, watching him stomp out of the room like a pissy Jewish raincloud.

A moment later his mother popped her nosy head in. "Eric, honey, did Kyle get angry with you?" she asked in a voice meant for infants. I put on my best syrupy-sweet smile for her anyway. "Only a little bit, Mrs. B. Is he usually this... Temperamental in the mornings?"

She laughed just as humorlessly as her son. "Temperamental. Yes, honey, he's... Not well." her eyes darkened for a moment. "Anyway, breakfast in fifteen minutes. You can shower afterwards."

I swallowed back my pride and put the same dirty clothes back on, groaning at the seemingly even stronger than before stench of gasoline and smoke, sharp and bitter and terribly familiar. I took a moment to glance at today's lyrics-_"Someone save me, if you will, and take away all these pills, and please just save me, if you can, from my blasphemy... In my wasteland."-Save Me, Shinedown_

Breakfast consisted of me nibbling at an apple and watching Gerald expertly cut his eggs with one hand while reading the newspaper and Sheila downing a bowl of cereal like she was racing to be first. And maybe she was, because she finished seconds before the bathroom door upstairs burst open and angry footsteps thumped their way back into Kyle's room, followed by a slammed door that made the ceiling tremble a bit. Both parents sighed simultaneously. "Who's turn is it?" Sheila whispered as she went to put her bowl in the sink. "Yours." Gerald responded guiltily, as though he might be lying, or maybe he just felt bad that his wife had to do whatever they were talking about.

"Bubbe?" she called up the stairs. "_NO!_" was quickly tossed back down at her.

She groaned, rubbing her temples. "Bubbe, please just come downstairs, those pills are going to tear your stomach to pieces if you don't eat, and you know that you need to watch your sugar intake-too little is just as bad as too much!"

"I don't want to eat!" he cried a little hysterically. Gerald sighed, looking up at the ceiling and threatening, "If you don't come down by the count of three, we're calling Stan to come get you. One... Two..."

"Wait!" he pleaded. "Stan doesn't know, don't call him, he thinks I'm better..."

"Come down stairs and Stan won't be called."

There were no footsteps. Or opening doors. Just a small noise that may or may not have been a little sob.

Gerald sighed, finally acknowledging my presence with a quiet, "Could you do me a favor and call Stan and tell him that Kyle is refusing to eat again? He refused dinner last night as well and Sheila and I aren't strong enough to force feed him..."

I nodded minutely, my face a mask of calm and collected while on the inside I couldn't help but beg to know why I had never seen this side of Kyle before. I'm supposed to know him better than anybody.

OoO

"Stan speaking." came a very much so half asleep voice, followed by a loud yawn that had me pulling the phone away from my war and glaring at it. Goddamn hippie. "The Jewrat is refusing food."

A myriad of interesting curses floated over phone, followed by a thump that indicated that the phone had been dropped to the bed. There was a loud shuffling-Stan struggling to get dressed enough to go outside, damn nudist hippie-then a quick, "One sec." and the line went dead.

I pocketed my cellphone-remarkably undamaged from the fire, other than a single crack across one corner-and instinctively turned to look up at the window to Kyle's bedroom, a little unnerved by the tear soaked emerald glare I found focused on me. The little redhead quickly disappeared from the window, though, leaving me to wait anxiously for the arrival of the other super best butt buddy.

I didn't have to wait long. It was only a couple minutes or so longer before he rounded the corner onto the Broflovskis' street, hair wild, shirtless, clad only in jeans and a single bright pink sock. I facepalmed and held the pose until he reached me, clapping a hand on my shoulder and continuing to jog towards the house, calling back tiredly, "Gotta nip it in the bud."

I followed him in, curious as to how this would all play out, and just barely caught Stan's back as he made his way up the stairs. I stood off to the corner of the kitchen/dining room, sensing that it was best to just stay out of the way. Muffled shouts and thuds and curses sounded from the teen's bedroom and a small smirk twisted my lips. And he calls _me _a drama queen. It was only another minute or so before Stan-now wearing a shirt, oddly enough-appeared at the top of the steps, holding the damn daywalker like a baby with one arm and keeping a firm grip of the teen's wrists with the other.

Kyle kept his face hidden dutifully in his super-best's chest, awfully still and judging from the killer's intent rolling off of him in waves, raging mad. Sheila and Gerald quickly evacuated the room but I stayed, eager to see how this would finish playing out. Stan gently sat the boy in one of the chairs, quickly but carefully fisting a handful of the boy's hair so he couldn't move. Kyle kept his head down like a scolded kitten.

"What would you like for breakfast, hun?" Stan asked softly and kindly. "My own goddamn arm." he bit out sarcastically.

"Cereal it is, then." Stan decided brightly, though he hesitated to let go of the redhead, who even I thought was liable to bolt. Silently, Stan pointed at the cabinet and nodded at me. Upon opening it, I found two boxes of cereal, a jar of raw honey and a loaf of bread. I shook my head and grabbed a box, some sort of health cereal. I already knew where the bowls were, and I poured out a healthy serving into one of them quickly, feeling Stan's eyes on the back of my head as I moved towards the fridge, pulling out a jug of two percent milk.

I grabbed a spoon and carefully walked over to the duo, setting the bowl down in front of the damn ginger. Stan shot a grateful smile at me and slowly crouched down, his hand sliding from his damp red locks down his shoulder.

"Ky, sweetheart," he sighed. "Please cooperate. You don't want Cartman to watch me force feed you, do you?"

Dark emerald eyes, downcast like a naughty child in trouble, glanced up at me and a very small blush bloomed across his cheeks. I quirked a sardonic half smile at him and he lowered his gaze again. "No." he murmured, more calmly than he had said anything all morning.

The noirette stood and held out a hand for the spoon, which I'd forgotten I still had. He took a seat, pulling it up closer to the Jew. I sat as well, watching as Stan scooped up a small bite and carefully leveled it at the teen's lips. His eyes flickered over to me once more, and I thought he would take it but he leaned back and shook his head defiantly.

"Goddammit Kyle." Stan sighed, pressing the spoon closer again. Kyle rose a hand as though to swat at it but Stan shot him an icy look and he returned it to his lap.

Changing tactics, the raven held the silver instrument in front of his own lips, threatening quietly with a meaningful glance in my direction, "Last chance."

They stared each other down for a long moment, each trying to call the other's bluff. Finally, Stan placed the spoon in his own mouth, pulling it out clean but not chewing or swallowing. Kyle's eyes widened dramatically and Stan shot out a hand to catch his jaw in a tight grip, leaning in quickly-"Okay, I'll eat!"

Stan sat back and slowly chewed and swallowed the bite in his mouth with a satisfied smirk, calmly scooping up another bite and holding it to the ginger's pale pink lips. With a disgusted grimace, he slowly allowed the instrument to enter his mouth, closing his lips around the neck and allowing Stan to pull it clean. He forced himself to chew and swallow and he gagged. "Kyle," Stan muttered warningly as he slowly patted the fragile teen on the back, "If you make yourself throw up, you'll be in trouble, do you understand?"

Nodding miserably and keeping his eyes down, Kyle straightened up, parting his lips for another bite but making no move to feed himself. Stan sighed patiently and looked up at me as he loyally began to hand feed his super-best. "Why don't you go to my place and shower, Cartman? Some of my baggier clothes should fit."

I nodded slowly, still trying to process this strange, scary new side of Kyle Broflovski, resident Jersey Ginger Jew.

"Stan, I don't want to eat any more." the redhead pleaded in a small voice. "You have to eat, Ky, you can't keep doing this..."

I slammed the front door on my way out.

OoO

_So anyway, that's that! Next chapter should include Christophe's entrance._

_**QUESTIONS, COMMENTS, CONCERNS? REVIEW! (LIKE, FOR SERIOUSLY THIS TIME, I WAS NOT FEELING THE LOVE LAST CHAPTER)**_


	4. Listless

_So... Kinda-sorta-not really a filler here. I thought about changing the Butters scene into a pyromania scene, but I need to introduce him into the story somehow. Also, I totally lied to y'all-Christophe NEXT chapter. Hopefully._

**Listless**

The hot water cascading harshly over my body was relaxing like you wouldn't believe. It burned so _pleasantly_ and for several long minutes I couldn't even begin bring myself to do much else but keep myself on my feet. Slowly, though, lethargically, I reached for the hippie's predictably floral scented soap, digging my fingers methodically, robotically through my overlong locks of hair, going over the scene from earlier again and again and again. It just didn't add up-The Jew _I_ knew was strong, defiant, independent, sturdy. The, the... Sniveling, fragile, vulnerable mess of a human being that had so timidly peered up at me from such a haunted state of mind this morning simply didn't register as being on the same plane of existence, leave alone as being the same goddamn _person._

And Stan... He handled it all like it was something he did all the time. Maybe it was. I let out a long, shuddery breath as I ducked my head under the steaming spray of water. Maybe it was. If so, what had caused such a dramatic deterioration? Was it always bubbling under the surface? Was it a medical thing? Did I even want to know?

I found I knew the answer to that last question. Yes. Yes I did.

OoO

I paced impatiently back and forth in Stan's bedroom, aware I was unnerving his poor mother downstairs with my thudding footsteps. I didn't care. I felt like a caged lion, and for a moment I entertained the mental image of a great golden cat with a fiery mane, snarling and tossing it's head from side to side as it paced from one end of it's cage to the other, tail flicking angrily. Perhaps it needs to get back to it's cub, I mused, imagining the same beast with a tiny, cowering lion cub sat between it's great, powerful paws. I decided that was a perfect analogy. I was a lion, and Kyle was the cub I needed to protect.

For a moment, I tried to remember if lions had protective instincts at all. I decided I didn't care.

So lost in my thoughts, I didn't realize that Stan had returned until there was suddenly a man in my pacing-path. For a moment, I continues to imagine myself a lion, lips pulled back into a deadly snarl, claws extended, hackles raised and fur bristling. I growled at the intruder and he quirked a hesitant smile at me. I shook my head. The illusion fell away.

"I demand to know what that," I gestured behind myself as though I were standing in front of the doorway to the Broflovski's kitchen as opposed to being on the other side of the neighborhood, "was all about, all the, all the vulnerability and weakness. What made him act like that, like the whole world was out to get him?"

Stan grimaced. "Look, it's hard to explain and I have to-"

"_Now_." I snarled. He flinched, but was quick to spit back vehemently, "He's _not well_, Cartman! He's very sick-sick at heart and sick at mind. He was up all night, wasn't he, tossing and turning? He couldn't read, Hm?" I stared at him. He glared back. "He threw a fit when he had to take his medicine and lyrics from _Save Me_ by _Shinedown_ are written on his board! This just _happens_, okay? He just collapses in on himself and there's nothing we can do, Cartman."

His glare was like ice. "This is how you play the game: The objective is to get Kyle through his episode alive. Kenny and I take him away and play caretaker, his parents talk to that horrible psychotherapist, and eventually either me or Kenny drag him kicking and screaming back to reality, and then we take him home and he goes back to school or whatever." he jabbed me in the chest with a forefinger, leaning into my personal space. I felt like a petulant child whining about something I didn't understand, all the sudden. "Do you know where you come in? _Nowhere_."

Cold. I lowered my eyes, wondering when the hippie grew a pair. He stalked past me to his closet, grabbing a backpack off the floor and marching towards the door like a man condemned. "We'll be back in a couple days."

I heard a door slam and a car engine start. I sighed.

OoO

I couldn't help but let my rage at the Fatass slip away when I made it back to the car, looking over my shoulder at the pair in the back.

Kenny was slumped against the door, a pillow behind his back to keep it from bruising against the harsh plastic, and Kyle was neatly fit between the blond's long legs, his wild head of curls rested on the teen's broad chest and his eyes closed softly. Kenny's slender, heavily calloused fingers danced lovingly over his back and shoulders, occasionally moving up to his hair. Slowly, sensing my gaze, his bright blue eyes lifted to mine, a somber smile twisting his lips. I tried to smile back but I couldn't-he seemed sympathetic enough. I turned back to stare out the windshield, tapping my fingers listlessly against the steering wheel.

I shut the door quietly and roughly turned the key, letting my mind go on autopilot. I knew exactly where I was going anyway.

OoO

I don't know why I've always found Butters so soothing, but I do, and I'll admit that to myself when I'm tired and confused. He let me in no questions asked, taking my hand with a friendly smile and leading me up the stairs to his room. I just let him-I hate the way he scolds himself when I snap at him. Reminds me too much of his damn dad. If I ever had a kid, I would take lessons from the adults in this town-Don't be a child like Randy, or a bitch like Sheila, or a drunk like Stuart, or a psycho like Linda, or white trash like Carol, or too busy like Gerald, or too much of an enabler like my own mother.

Ha-Who am I kidding? Any kid of mine will be lucky to escape the house alive.

Butters' room hadn't changed much since he was twelve or so. My Little Pony posters, Hello Kitty bedspread, stuffed animals on the shelves, lilac walls, pink carpet, flower shaped purple rug... It was comforting, in a way, like visiting a little girl's room-so peaceful and innocent.

However badly people say I treat Butters (most of that stems from my animosity towards him back when he was 'in love with' Kyle), I look out for him, and when I'm overwhelmed, he's always willing to be my voice of reason-or to just keep me company while I brood.

"H-how are you faring, Eric? What with the, uh, with the fire an' your mother an' all..." He trailed off, looking off to the side, and I rolled my eyes at him, scoffing, "I have to stay with the goddamn Jew all the time now, how do you think I'm doing?"

He smiled patiently at me, sitting on his bed daintily. I noticed he was wearing a yellow blouse with frilly sleeves. Fag. "Now, now, Eric," he sounded like my mom with that sugary tone, "If you ever w-want to charm him or woo him or whatever it is you want to c-call it, you have to spend time with him, show him that... That big heart of yours!"

I shot him a sarcastic but somewhat fond smirk and he beamed right back. That's what I come here for, optimism. I flopped face first down onto his soft, soft, soft bed, suddenly struck by how tired I really was. I felt like I had been forced to run all day, only to go home and have to try and read Shakespeare for a couple hours. My head hurt and my limbs felt heavy...

"I don't want to woo him or charm him..." I muttered, but I couldn't really think of a better word for it. All I wanted was for him to look at me with adoration, for him to let me touch him and kiss him, for a chance to love him properly instead of from the sidelines like an obsessed groupie. "And I don't have a big heart."

"Oh, Eric." he sighed fondly. "You might try to a-act all tough and indifferent, but on the inside..." he smiled, "You're like a t-teddy bear."

I hid a grimace in his bedspread, absently wondering why he still had that stutter. It was kind of cute, in a way. Endearing.

"Plus, he's gone the next couple'a days, isn't he?"

Slowly, I rose my gaze to meet his eyes. "How did _you _know?"

"Oh, Kenny t-tells me these things. I feel so bad for him, Kyle, that is. Always in and out of that therapy thing Ken and Stan set up for 'im, missin' school an' such." Butters seemed to realize a moment after he finished that he shouldn't have told me, faltering with a guilty expression. "Oh, hamburgers..."

"I didn't know you still talked to Kenny." I changed the subject quickly so he wouldn't beat himself up over letting something slip-and so that maybe he'd keep talking.

He stared at me with those big baby blue eyes (I know a LOT of people with blue eyes-Stan, Craig, Kenny, Butters, Ike...) and slowly a deep blush bloomed across his pale cheeks. I'm sure I must have looked like a Cheshire cat, grinning as widely as I was at this unspoken revelation.

"First the Jewrat and now poor boy?" I shook my head, letting out a short chuckle. His cheeks went even darker. "You, my friend, have bad taste."

"Well," he retorted in that pouty way of his, "Considering _you_ were my first crush, I'd have to agree." His cheeks flushed again and I let out a little laugh of surprise. "For seriously?"

He nodded a little, eyes fixed on his hands. I smiled, turning over onto my back and gesturing down at myself and my ill-fitting clothing, "Well, I can't say I blame you. I am quite sexy."

That's why I like the little weirdo. Nothing's ever _really _awkward, even if he is a little fag.

OoO

I spent the day with Butters. It was nice-it got my mind off the Jew and his strange new behavior, though it did bother me that this had apparently been going on for months-years? Whatever.

It was a lazy kind of day. I caught a short nap while he did chores and we baked together. Even though it's a bit domestic for my tastes, a lot of my fondest memories -from the time I was a toddler- revolve around the kitchen, especially the memories of my mother teaching me how to cook for myself.

With the taste of warm chocolate cookies still lingering in our mouths and the delicious scent of the lemon cake in the oven wafting through the air, we settled down on the couch, a small fire going in the fireplace. It was peaceful. I would miss these lazy days spent with Butters soon, after everything went to Hell in a handbasket and that French asshole showed up.

But for the moment... This was enough.

"Butters, you asshole, share the covers!"

"They won't f-fit around you, you F-fatass!"

OoO

Kyle was finally asleep. He'd stubbornly refused to do anything we asked of him-he wouldn't eat, he wouldn't get ready for bed, he wouldn't lie down or even attempt to sleep... Eventually, Stan coaxed him into it, but I had to leave the room while he was doing so. "It won't work if you're there," he'd said, but judging by the blush on his cheeks and the way he averted his eyes, I'd say it was less something that had to be private and more something embarrassingly sappy left over from when they were kids.

Stan had come back into our room like a man on death row, shoulders slumped, eyes down, feet dragging. He crawled onto his bed and sat crossed-legged in the middle, elbows on his thighs, face in his hands. As I watched on sympathetically, his shoulders began to shake subtly and his breathing became unsteady. He sobbed quietly and I flinched. Stan doesn't cry often.

I slid off the cheap hotel mattress and glided as silently as possible to the foot of his bed, staring at him, watching him tremble and fight back agonized sobs. Poor thing. I moved to kneel in front of him on the bed, sitting back on my feet. For a moment, my hands remained stationary in my lap, but I forced myself to reach up and gently run my knuckles against the back of his palms to get his attention. He looked up slowly, revealing tear-streaked cheeks and heartbroken blue eyes.

My lips quirking instinctively into a small, sad smile, I gently rubbed away the tears staining his skin. I almost asked why he was crying -Stan has never cried during one of Kyle's meltdowns- but l decided it was a stupid question last second.

"Kenny..." he whined brokenly. He seemed so _small_, so sad and pitiful. I leaned closer to him, over him, entirely too close... He didn't stop me. His lips were cool and soothing against my own, comforting in the slow way they moved even as more tears fell, their taste reaching my tongue-salty, bitter. I cupped his face in my hands and leaned farther over him, tilting him back towards the bed. Obediently, he uncrossed his legs as he fell, wrapping his arms around my neck so he didn't break our kiss, pulling me down on top of him.

It felt so good to be so close, and he was so warm. I slid my hands from his face, down his neck, across his chest, his abs. I was a little disturbed by how solid, how masculine he was as opposed to the soft, delicate girls (and sometimes boys, I'll admit) that I was used to. I didn't let it bother me. My hands wandered down farther and I was rewarded with a breathy gasp. He wasn't crying anymore. I kissed down his neck and shoved my hands up his shirt, tracing over the contours and crevices of his strong torso. He pushed himself up and took off his shirt in possibly the least graceful way I've ever seen. I smirked and he averted his eyes as I pulled off my own shirt in one quick movement.

Stan just rolled his eyes and pulled me back down, kissing me as though I might break and wrapping his arms around my waist. I was suddenly acutely aware of how much taller and stronger he was than me and I couldn't help but feel a bit put-out, a bit shy.

Suddenly, I was on my back, and he was knelt between my legs, sucking gently at my pulse-point. I shuddered, tilting my head to the side, feeling the hand he wasn't using to support himself curiously explore my chest.

_Okay,_ I thought as calmly as I could, _Whatever makes him feel better._

But as he moved against me, over me, _inside _me, I found that I felt better, too.

OoO

_So? How was that? I know the Stenny scene was kind of... lacking, but I didn't want to linger on them too long and, frankly, writing lemons is awkward as fuck. I have three active projects for school coming up and finals, but then I'm all yours from December 19th to January 2nd, so... Yay!_

_**QUESTIONS, COMMENTS, CONCERNS? REVIEW!**  
><em>


	5. Wanna Be an Angel

_I know I keep promising Christophe, but the way I see him entering the equation is a bit hard to lead up to-I needed to build a sort of unspoken truce between my dear protagonists. A trust that will make the nightmare scene plausible, which will then make said trust at the peak of it's fragility. MUAHAHAHA! Anyway. This is a transition chapter-Christophe next time, I swear. _

**God Knows I Don't Want to be an Angel**

There had been a new kind of tension after our first night at the makeshift recuperation center, but for once, I wasn't the center of it. Rather, it revolved more closely around my temporary caretakers-they were, of all things, avoiding each other, instead of clinging to each other for support like they usually did when I snapped. Even now, four days since Cartman got out of the hospital, as we drove back home in silence, that same tension was thick and smothering in the cool inside of Stan's old red Chevy.

The person I am when I have to be taken away is different than the one that I am when I'm gone, and different than the one that I am upon returning home. I don't view these trips as being real, not entirely. But this time, I had to grudgingly take away from this that something had happened between my two closest friends... And for once it wasn't my fault.

I watched the scenery pass by in silence, glad that I was alone in the passenger seat, the uncomfortable memory of being nestled into Kenny's arms still fresh in my memory, like cut across the already scarred surface of my pride. I turned my arms over to reveal the soft underside of my arms, staring at the places where I know, if I were to look closely, I would find neat rows of small white scars.

I caught Stan looking at my arms as well, glancing between them and the country road spanning out before us.

"We're gonna be okay now, hm?"

I quirked an automatic smile as Kenny murmured an affirmative. Stan always asks us that. "Maybe." I said as I always do, like a self-fulfilling prophecy.

I would be okay, maybe. For now.

OoO

Staying with the Broflovski's hasn't been as bad as I expected it to be. Mrs. Broflovski brought me some clothing the other day-just enough jeans and T-shirts to last from laundry day to laundry day, really, until I can take inventory of what the fire didn't destroy. I felt a little more at home in Kyle's room now, with clothes in the drawers I cleared out in his dresser and _'Gott weß ich will kein engel sein'_ written on his chalkboard.

The day after Kyle disappeared, I went out and got a lighter. It made me feel sick to my stomach -smothered, even- when I went to light it, but I kept it in my pocket anyway. I couldn't decide whether or not it was soothing.

I tried to stay out of my hosts' way, for the most part. Ike glared at me whenever he saw me and it was almost like he was accusing me, his stare all too dark and intelligent to be a child's. It was disconcerting. Sheila and Gerald were nice enough. The man of the house didn't talk to me very much but he didn't make a point of avoiding me either, and the matriarch had been as attentive as possible to my needs, which, really, was kind of nice. Having a mother-hen figure instead of a friend in the mother's role, that is.

I didn't want to bother them, though -or, really, do anything at all- so I stayed in the room I kind of tried to make mine.

So that's exactly where Kyle found me when he returned. He stepped into his room and immediately hit the lights. He sighed and glanced around the room -I'd kept it pretty neat- and paused when he reached me, back pressed against the headboard, a cigarette lighter clutched loosely in my hands. He looked a bit better, I thought, than last time I'd seen him-more healthy and less... Like he'd had his soul violently torn from his chest. To put it lightly.

"Why do you have a lighter?" he inquired softly, his expression blank yet somehow softer than the looks I usually got from him. It weirded me out, to be honest, and I was so distracted by it that I accidentally revealed more than I usually would, responding quickly and quietly, "I can't light it."

Another contemplative stare. He shut the door without looking away, his emerald gaze almost seeming to pin me in place with it's flat kindness. "Is it broken?"

I shook my head slowly. Not that I knew of. I still hadn't managed to light it due to how badly my fingers trembled when I tried.

"It's common for firestarters to associate their trauma with fire after the first time they're badly burned or something dramatic is caused by their fires. Many will stop lighting." He said all this like a book on criminal psychology lay open before him. I vaguely wondered if he was right or if he was drawing false information from his own inferences and assumptions as he was prone to doing.

"The term is pyromaniac." I muttered. "It's an obsession, not a hobby."

Finally, true emotion broke the mask on his face. He rolled his eyes, lips pulling into an annoyed scowl. "Whatever, fatass." he sneered as he finally ventured into his room, looking around once more as if he were trying to make a full damage report. He wouldn't find any damage, I didn't think.

His eyes landed on his chalkboard and he clumsily tried to read it aloud, "_'Got web itch will kein angel sein?'_"

I briefly squeezed my eyes shut in annoyance and light amusement. He pronounced it 'web'. "The Eszett is pronounced like a double S, Jew. It's _'Gott weiß ich will kein engel sein.'_"

His shoulders tensed up. He hated being corrected. After a moment, he relaxed, though, probably having reassured himself that there was no way he could have possibly known anything about German and that I was fluently bilingual. "What does it mean?"

I paused. He'd think I was a bit of a freak for this, but really, he should. "_'God knows I don't want to be an angel.'_"

I stared at the back of his head and Kyle stared at the words. He murmured them again, with slightly better pronunciation than before. He was still saying _'ich'_ like _'itch'_ though, and _'engel'_like it's English counterpart.

"Hello is _'Hallo'_," I murmured softly, thinking he might appreciate the lesson. He didn't respond so I went on. "And Goodbye is _'Lebewohl'_. Yes is _'Ja'_ and No is _'Nein'_. And to say that you don't speak German, just say, _'Ich spreche kein Deutsch'_."

He didn't face me, instead choosing to carefully erase my messy German from the board, picking up the chalk and writing in it's place, _'Show me how to lie, I'm getting better all the time, and turning all against the one is an art that's hard to teach.'_

"_Rammstein _is weird." he muttered, dropping the chalk with a hollow clink and turning towards his bed. "And that's your theme song."

I looked back at the board. _Gonna Go Far, Kid_ by _the Offspring_. I'd never even heard of the band. "Yours is _Handlebars_ by _Flobots_. And Stan's is _Inside Out_ by _Eve 6_." I countered, relieved that I wasn't the only one who thought about these things.

He smirked at me and flopped down on his bed, obviously tired. It was only eight thirty, though... "Kenny's is _Worth Dying For_ by _Rise Against_."

I shook my head a little, a little weirded out that we weren't fighting yet. "I kinda thought it would be _Lowlife_ by _Theory of a Deadman_."

He frowned thoughtfully. "That'd work. Butters' would be _Island in the Sun_ by _Weezer_, and Craig's would be _I Hate My Life_ by _Theory of a Deadman_. What would Tweek's be?"

"_Paranoid_ by _Black Sabbath_?"

"_Odd One_ by _Sick Puppies_?"

"_Basket Case_ by _Green Day_?"

Kyle paused at this last suggestion and nodded thoughtfully, a bit of oddly appropriate yet misplaced respect shining in his green gaze. He yawned and pushed himself up off the bed with visible reluctance, stumbling a little as he forced himself to walk back towards his dresser and start rifling through the drawers. "You cleared two of them out."

I had. I needed some place to put my clothes. I didn't tell him this-he was stating a fact, not accusing me. "Goddamn my OCD." he muttered irritably as he began to rearrange things. He froze momentarily and called over his shoulder, "Did you touch the bottom lefthand drawer?"

"No?"

He relaxed and continued to organize things, opening the righthand bottom drawer and emptying half of it into the top left drawer and the other half into the middle lefthand drawer. "You take all three righthand drawers. I won't mess with your stuff if you don't mess with mine-don't look under my bed, don't go through the boxes in my closet, don't go through my drawers, and don't touch my dry erase boards."

I nodded despite the fact that he had his back to me. Fair enough, I guess, though now my curiosity was piqued. What could be in that drawer that freaked him out so bad? I decided not to go through it just yet. I'd wait. I smirked a little. Then again, we were being so calm and civilized towards each other... Did I want to disrupt this peace and quiet, this unspoken alliance?

I soon found that this was just the calm before the storm anyway.

OoO

After we dropped off Kyle and Kenny hopped into the front seat, our awkward silence increased to an uncomfortable degree. I didn't know what to do-I had sex with _Kenny_, for crissakes!

I glanced over at him and caught his gaze. A light blush bloomed over his face-mirroring mine, I'm sure. I turned my eyes back to the road, trying to forget the way he looked the other night. Fuck. The silence was killing me. "How long do you think it'll be until Kyle breaks down again? With Cartman living in his room?" I tried. Kenny just shrugged.

Resigned, I drove in silence the next few miles, passing my house and driving over the traintracks that separate the good part of South Park and the bad. The longer we drove, the more broken down the homes became-Kenny didn't live in the worst part of town, but he didn't live in a very good part, either. One of the windows was boarded over, I noticed, and there was a duct-taped hole in his front door. These were just the newest editions to the deterioration of his home-the roof was as holed as ever, the yard was mostly dead and covered in trash and things like a rusted tricycle and part of a busted tire, and there was a broken rocking chair on his porch. There were no signs of light in the home, despite the fast approaching dusk, indicating that the electricity had been shut off again. Normally, this would be when I 'remembered' that my parents told me I could have Kenny over anytime and offered to let him stay with me, but I wasn't sure if he'd even agree to come over.

I didn't realize that Kenny was staring until I turned to look back at him. His brilliant blue eyes were unsure and nervous, a huge contrast to their usual amused sparkle. I smiled weakly and held up a fist in an offer, asking quietly, "Bros?"

He reached out, but instead of a fist bump, he merely caught my fist in his palm and closed his calloused fingers around it. The look in his eye was unreadable but oddly exciting in a nerve-racking kind of way that set me a bit on edge. "Kenny?"

He leaned in. Close. Too close. I whispered his name again, and he echoed with my own, leaning out of his seat to press his lips lightly against my own. They were gone -taking their soft warmth with them- in seconds, before I could react. He sat back and undid his seatbelt, letting go of my fist and bumping it lightly, before opening the door and hopping out, grinning like a maniac.

I stared after him even after he disappeared into his house, fingertips pressed against my lips and a blush on my cheeks.

Well, okay. That works.

OoO

Kyle again insisted on leaving the room to change, stomping out in a huff when I demonstrated that normal guys could be shirtless around each other while getting ready for bed. He had a serious problem with exposed skin, I guess. It didn't bother me none, but I put the pajamas Mrs. Broflovski insisted on getting me (for this very reason?) on anyway. Whatever, Kyle was a weird ass Jew.

When he returned, his hair was brushed and he was in a pair of Mario pants and a Spiderman Tshirt that I'm pretty sure belonged to Stan. "Nerd." I snorted, earning an eye-roll, as he walked over to his dresser -he used the damn thing like a desk- and set down a large glass of sweet tea and two clear blue gel pills. He left them there for the moment, turning toward his bed -left unmade since the morning he took off- and groaning a little as he started to make it, tucking his plush green blanket under his giant blue feather pillow (it was the only thing he asked for on his thirteenth birthday) and picking his quilt up off the floor, draping it over the foot of his bed and folding it neatly.

I rose an eyebrow at him as he turned to share his exasperated expression with me. "Jew, did you just... Make your bed?"

"Yes."

I blinked. Well then. "Why?"

"I can't sleep in unmade beds."

I was glad he turned away do he didn't see the soft smile that formed on my lips, amused by his eccentricity. "What are the pills for?" I asked as he placed the first pill on his tongue and downed a good third of his tea. I smirked-Kyle loves sweet tea with a fiery passion.

"Melatonin supplements. They help me sleep." I nodded a little, watching him down the other pill and the rest of his tea before snatching up his glucometer and pressing it deftly to the tip of his designated blood-drawing digit, popping the bleeding appendage in his mouth as he watched the screen of his monitor. I frowned. I had never linked his sweet tea and his diabetes together.

"Jew? Aren't you not supposed to have sugar?"

He glanced over at me in confusion, but quickly made the connection and smiled a little, eyes drawing back to the technology in his hand. "Diabetisweet. An artificial sweetener. We keep regular sugar around for everyone else, but everything communal that calls for sugar is made with Diabetisweet. It took us forever to find the a sugar substitute we liked. We have to order it by mail. And in case you were curious, yes, everything in the house is Kosher, and everything is sugar free except the third shelf from the bottom in the pantry and the top shelf of the refrigerator."

The glucometer beeped and he seemed pleased by the results. "My blood sugar is within my ideal range." he informed me like this was an impressive accomplishment. My brow furrowed. "Congratulations?"

He shook his head with a quiet laugh and starting to fiddle absently with his monitor, bracing his knees comfortably against his dresser. "I always either undershoot it or overshoot it by, like, three points."

I nodded. I understood how that could be frustrating, especially if you were a perfectionist like he was.

Apparently satisfied with whatever he was doing with his glucometer, he moved to turn out the lights, speaking absently as he walked, "It's hard to put on weight, you know, being diabetic and Jewish. No sweets cuts out a huge part of it, and the Kashrut basically says, _"Fuck no."_to fastfood. I also can't eat anything the school offers so I mostly only eat dinner during the school year. Did you know that a healthy human being is supposed to eat five times a day? Just small things. Anyway, I have a friend who's diabetic, lactose intolerant, allergic to glucose and absolutely abhors citrus. He weighs over two hundred pounds and he's my height. I keep asking him how he manages to not be, like, twenty pounds underweight like I am, and he always just says that his mama loves him, which I don't think is a very good answer because my mama loves me, definitely, and I'm tiny. Then again, dad says I inherited my stature from my granny... Ike is getting pretty big, you know, I think he'll be the tallest person in the family, eventually."

He was sitting on his bed, now, staring at his hands like he'd forgotten I was there. Perhaps he had, for a moment later he whipped his head up and looked at me embarrassedly, like he'd forgotten I was there. I'm sure that if it weren't so dark, I'd be able to see the blush no doubt staining his cheeks. "I'm sorry." he muttered sheepishly, shuffling to get under the blankets in his freshly made bed. "I talk to myself a lot when I'm alone in here."

"No, no..." I encouraged, having been strangely enthralled and soothed by his little rant. "By all means."

Surprisingly enough, he took me up on that, and we both stared at the ceiling as we talked back and forth about anything and everything, open and honest and quiet. About an hour later, his words became spotted with yawns and I smiled fondly as he fell asleep in the middle of a sentence about a book he'd read once when he was twelve.

I was relaxed, more so than I'd been since the incident, and to my surprise, after weeks of broken sleep, I fell unconscious quickly.

OoO

_So here we go. The longest chapter so far. Anyway, I realize that a lot of you were unhappy with the Stenny... But fuck you guys. :) Just kidding. BTW, you should go listen to the songs mentioned in this chapter-I listen to good music._


	6. Are You Lost?

_Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Joyous Kwanza! And a pleasant Sunday for those Witnesses out there who would never be caught dead reading a slashy South Park fanfiction!_

**Are You Lost?**

It had been three weeks since we took Kyle home, and for once... Life was going good for me. It was summer, so me, Kenny, Cartman and Kyle spent practically every day together, swimming at Stark's (though Kyle insisted we wear shirts), playing videogames in my basement, playing basketball at the park, going to the movies to see lame summer flicks, just... Hanging out. Kyle and Cartman didn't even fight, not like they usually would. Normally, when forced to spend this much time together, they would be at each other's throats, but... Kyle seemed happier than ever, Cartman was fine as long as you didn't mention that construction had mysteriously begun on his half-burned-down house, and their arguments seemed almost... Playful.

"Hey, fatty!" Kyle ribbed, shoving the brunette with his elbow. Cartman mock growled, not taking his eyes from the screen as he tried to shoot down the sniper taking aim at him (Kyle, of course) with an SMG from long range. "What, you damn Jew?"

"Boom, headshot!"

I laughed as the kill screen popped up over Cartman's fourth of the screen, merely leaning away and setting my controller down as the larger teen tackled my super best -though not roughly- and began to playfight, rolling over and over and conspicuously not landing any hard hits. I glanced over at Kenny, mirth in my eyes, only to see that he had fallen asleep. He often got bored with games because his curse of dying, while not really a problem very often in real life any more, seemed to have carried over to the gameworld, where a stray bullet on the other side of the map meant death for player four.

I reached out and squeezed his knee, ignoring the yelps and curses from behind me in favor of smiling softly at the blond as he cracked his eyes open and yawned, stretching like a cat. He offered ms a sleepy smile and glanced at the screen just in time to see the game glitch and watch player four -randomly teleported upwards a couple hundred feet- fall from the sky and hit the ground, instant death.

Kenny laughed quietly, the sound soft and familiar. I blushed a little and he smirked at me before returning his attention to the pair who had finally given up and were untangling themselves, sending each other mock glares and smile-softened death threats. "You guys done making out?"

Both if their cheeks flushed red in anger and embarrassment and they simultaneous started yelling at the thoroughly amused immortal. I shook my head with a light smile and patiently waited for them to loose steam.

"It's getting late, guys." I mentioned as their indignation died out. "Doesn't Mrs. B. want you guys home, like, ten minutes from now?"

Kyle checked his phone and cursed, turning his distressed green eyes on the equally concerned brunette. "Dude, more like ten minutes _ago_, we better get home!"

"Shit." Cartman muttered, scrambling to his feet and almost absently offering Kyle a hand up. The redhead took it without thought, letting the bigger teen haul him to his feet with ease. "Here're your shoes, Cartman." he called, kicking them closer to the boy, who was frantically trying find said footcoverings.

Kyle shoved on his converse and zipped up his Pokémon hoodie -it can get pretty chilly during South Park Summer nights- scrambling up the stairs and calling back, "Bye, Stan! Bye, Kenny, see you tomorrow!"

Cartman offered no such goodbye, instead only urging Kyle to go faster with a hand on his lower back. "See you, losers!"

_Jesus._The front door slammed shut.

"That was really weird." Kenny voiced immediately. "Scratch that, they've _been _really weird. What's been up with them? They've been acting like... Like friends. Only... Y'know... Weirder."

I snorted. "Oh, _Kenny_. You have such a way with words." I crooned sarcastically. He smirked at me, ignoring the dying cry of his respawned character in favor of leaning in for a short kiss. I shut my eyes on instinct, enjoying the now familiar sensation of his warm, chapped lips moving against my own. He pulled back and I reluctantly opened my eyes only to see him pulling himself to his feet.

I blinked up at him and his smirk melted into a fond smile. "As much as I would love to stay-" he winked-"Butters gets back from drama camp in, like, fifteen minutes, and I promised we'd have a sleep over the night he got back." He rolled his eyes in exasperation at the little blond's girly childishness, but I knew that Kenny was extremely fond of the innocent kid and that he'd missed him.

"Alright." I muttered a little reluctantly, pushing myself to my feet and winding my arms around my boyfriend's waist. "Kiss for the road?"

Kenny smiled up at me-I thought it was adorable that he was an inch or two shorter-and wound his arms around my neck, popping one of his feet up and planting a sloppy kiss on my lips with a wet _Mwah!_noise.

I chuckled as he pulled back and beamed at me like a dog who'd performed a particularly difficult trick. He was pretty in his own right, a very pretty young man with smooth skin and a mop of soft gold hair, clear blue eyes and a knockout easygoing smile. I smoothed one of my palms up his back to his neck, holding him still as I pressed my lips to his again, nudging his lips apart and doing my best to kiss him senseless, pressing forward until he was bent back so far that I was the only thing keeping him from falling.

When we parted both of us were panting softly from the effort, my arms trembling just slightly with the challenge of keeping the very solid teen up. I tilted him back up onto his feet and he pulled me tightly against him, burying his eyes in my neck. "You sure you can't stay?" I asked quietly, smoothing my hands up and down his back, feeling the muscles and the ridges of his spine and ribs.

He broke away and leaned up on his tippy toes to kiss my forehead, sighing as he rocked back onto the flats of his feet. "I'm quite sure." he murmured, resolve noticeably less firm, and I grinned, pushing back the selfish desire to get him to stay and instead urging, "Better get going then, or you might be late for the tea party!"

OoO

When we reached his door, Kyle paused, looked at me and whispered with a conspiratorial wink, "Play along and look apologetic."

"Mama!" he called as he threw open the front door, worry and guilt clear in his tone. Predictably, the Mother Jew was standing in the foyer, arms crossed, foot tapping. Kyle offered her his best stricken expression, and I bit my lip to push down my smile. Drama queen. "I'm so sorry, mama! We left for the house a half hour ago, but on the way home, there was this little girl..."

"And her new puppy had run off!" I butted in automatically, nodding a little when Kyle smiled thankfully at me. "She was a cute little girl, all brown pigtails and pudge, and she looked about ready to cry, and she kept calling for Daisy."

Kyle bit his lip. "So we helped her look, and eventually we heard a whining noise, and suddenly this adorable golden retriever puppy ran up out of nowhere and the little girl squealed and picked it up and thanked us, and we walked her home since it was getting dark. We would've been home on time, honest!"

Mrs. Broflovski eyed us both up and down suspiciously. "What was the little girl's name?"

Kyle faltered so I piped up, "I think it was Mary Anne or Mary Lou. She was a sweet little girl, too, only seven or so."

She still looked unsure. "And what kind of dog was it, Eric, dear?"

"A golden retriever." I answered without missing a beat.

She turned to Kyle. "And what was the dog's name?"

He froze for all of a second before responding almost flawlessly, "Daisy, Daisy May."

She eyed us both, arms still crossed against her chest, intimidating with her presence though she was only a short, dumpy woman, and a Jew at that. "Fine." she relented with a sigh as she turned around. "I believe you. Now, go wash up for bed, okay?"

We both nodded vigorously and thundered up the stairs, stopping at the top to cling to each other in silent laughter. Kyle recovered first, straightening up with a little difficulty under the weight of my hand on his shoulder, and whispered with a playful wink, "We make a good team."

That stopped my laughter. I straightened up and looked down, down, down at him, smiling gently back at him. "Yeah." I agreed, heart thundering. He was right there, right within my grasp, almost mine to take. Almost there...

I caught myself leaning down and stopped short, closer than normal, hand still rested on his shoulder. "Cartman..." he sighed, and I felt my heart lurch a bit in my chest. So. Agonizingly. Close.

"Eric." I corrected quietly, hesitantly. I don't know what made me say it, but I was glad I did, because he echoed me without thought, a whisper in _his_voice of my given name. "Eric."

My breath caught in my throat and he laughed, turning and calling over his shoulder as he disappeared into the bathroom, "Could you grab some pajamas for me? Thanks!"

The door clicked shut. Heart racing, I tried to collect myself. The shower clicked on and I forced myself to move, robotically shuffling into our shared bedroom, glancing over at the words scribbled across his chalkboard. _"I see a red door and I want to paint it black-no colors any more, I want them to turn black."-Paint it Black by The Rolling Stones_

I shook my head and knelt in front of his dresser, opening the bottom drawer on his side on instinct. What greeted me, however, was not clothes (preferably of the sleepwear variety) but a very thick leather scrapbook, old and messily put together. Belatedly, I recalled him telling me weeks ago, _"Don't look under my bed, don't go through the boxes in my closet, don't go through my drawers, and don't touch my dry erase boards."_

But, I reasoned quickly in a voice that sounded suspiciously like the speech impedimented slur of my younger self, it was much too late for that. Glancing around with a hint of guilt I wasn't familiar with, I picked up the heavy book and set it in my lap. I opened up the cover, and I was greeted with a childish, messy crayon drawing of the South Park sign on a page made brittle by age. I flipped the page again I was met with... My childhood. No, his childhood, Stan's childhood, Kenny's childhood, Butters' childhood... Our childhood.

The first lines were, _"Things have been kind of weird around here lately, so I decided that maybe it was time to start keeping a journal."_

Everything was there-and usually he had the full story, dates, anecdotes from other people, add ons from later dates... He had the first time I was abducted by aliens, the time Kyle saw Passion of Christ and I lead a march on the synagogue, the last day we spent with Chef, the time I convinced everyone I was psychic, when Mr. Mackey tried to teach sex ed, the time we went after Tweek's gnomes, the time Kenny died for a year, the Imagination land fiasco, the time I thought I died, the time Stan almost became a prophet for the Scientologists, the time the guys tricked ms into thinking I was Ginger, the time Michael Jackson moved in, the time mom hired a dog trainer, the time Stan got served and Butters killed more people with his dancing... Everything. All of it. News clippings, pictures, flyers, and handwritten stories-and on one page, a fuckton of obituaries, the vast majority of them being Kenny's but one for Pip, Chef, that crazy bus driver... Other friends and peers we've lost. There was a spot reserved for when Stan's Grampa finally bites the dust.

But after our last amazing adventures, ending around the time we started fifth grade with an unimpressive trailing off, he started to keep a personal journal. Was this what I heard him writing in late at night as he sang so softly to himself? Evidently. He still kept it. I read glimpses and pieces here and there, eyes flitting around too fast to take in anything, catching random words, my name, Stan's name, South Park...

OoO

I sighed as the soothingly cool water flowed over my back, through my hair, everywhere, like a balm to the daily stress of life, though admittedly, life hadn't been too stressful lately. Well, not in the normal sense...

My thoughts drifted back to how things have gone almost every night these last few weeks. I'd be woken-or sometimes just alerted-by a quiet whimper, the rustle of sheets as he tossed and turned fretfully. I'd sit up just as he little cries desolved into screams of terror, echoing through the house and probably waking Ike, but he was used to me waking up with nightmares and probably just sighed into the dark and rolled over. Jerking awake, he would hit the floor with a thump and sit up, curling into a ball and crying softly into his knees. The first night this happened, I rushed to his side and I almost got punched in the face. Since then I've learned to wait until he calms down, laying back as though asleep.

Eventually, he would straighten up shakily, taking in a shuddery breath, and he would stand with his back to me for a moment before he turned towards my bed, head down, fists clenched by his sides. I'd stay still as he moved to the side of my bed, eyes shut, and he would carefully crawl into bed like a child, under the blanket, pressing close with his head on my chest and his arm loosely slung over my hips.

_"Kyle..." _he had murmured.

I sighed. I didn't ask him about the nightmares, or why he crawled into bed with me. And he said nothing about it-he still waited for my medication and insulin to take effect before he said good morning, and by the time I felt like a human being and I was showered, it didn't seem to matter as much. And so it went unspoken, but we had grown so close in these last weeks, even during daylight hours. Less like we were enemies and more like we were merely rivals, perhaps even... Friends.

It was nice. It was comfortable. It would all crash down around me when I ventured out of the bathroom, confused by the absence of clean clothes to put on. Oh well. That's life. _C'est la vie. So ist das Leben._

OoO

A shocked gasp sounded behind me and I slammed the book closed and panickedly threw the scrapbook into the drawer, kicking it shut as I scrambled away from the forbidden object I was caught looking through. I looked up at him, hair soaked, eyes bright with hurt, cheeks flushed with rage, clothes haphazardly shoved back on, fists clenched in rage.

"You looked through my book?" he snarled.

"You're_ gay_?" I gasped back, something from his journal finally catching up with me. "A-and you tried to kill yourself? Your brother had cancer? Where was I for all this?"

He screeched in rage, marching over to me with murder in his eyes. I scrambled backwards but suddenly he was looming over me, and a moment later I hit my side hard against the floor, the right side of my face throbbing from the unexpectedly harsh impact of his fist. I pushed myself up to see him shoving on shoes -one red converse and one black, I noted dazedly- with his scrap book tucked under one arm.

"Wait, where are you going?" I cried as he stomped out, watching my chances crumble, watching our closeness dissipate. I pushed myself to my feet and raced out of the room after him, seeing him shove the book into a surprised looking Ike's arms and continue down the stairs, obviously heading for the front door.

"Fuck off, fatass!" he screamed, hurt and anger tangling dangerously in his tone. I caught up with him as he was shrugging on his jacket by the front door, ignoring his mother's inquiries about what had happened and where he was going. "Kyle, wait a second-"

"_NO!_"

I flinched. Mrs. Broflovski smartly melted away, disappearing up the stairs.

"No, goddammit! I'm tired of this little dance of yours! I'm tired of this game! I'm tired of-of thinking I can trust you!" Tears formed in his brilliant green eyes and fell down his cheeks like crystalized pain. I lowered my eyes for a moment as he continued in a smaller voice, "You've been doing this to me for too long, and I swear to God, Cartman, that was your very last chance. It's over and done with."

He opened the door and, through my heartbreak, I saw that he was serious. I had messed up. Desperately, I grabbed him around the waist, holding him tightly to my chest as he screamed and kicked and hit and fought to get away, fought to escape. I held him as though I were trying to press him into the wound he'd ripped across my calloused heart, as though he were the only thing in the world keeping me from falling apart.

"Let me go!" I ignored him, fisting my hand in his hair and yanking his head back, pressing my lips to his in a clash of teeth, a rush of anger, frustration, passion, lust. I pulled back, tasting the blood from some wound neither of us had noticed yet, staring nakedly down into his confused, pained, surprised emerald irises.

"Let me go, Cartman."

"_I love you!_"

Tears welled in his eyes again, and in mine, blurring my vision as I angrily blinked them away, watching one of them fall onto his cheek. "Let me go." he repeated again, tone quiet and soothing. My throat hurt. "Please!" I pleaded, voice breaking as I sobbed, sliding to my knees and clutching at his legs, face pressed into his abdomen. "Please, Kyle, please don't leave!"

He stepped delicately out of my hold and took off out into the night, running like a bat out of hell. I buried my face in my hands and cried, crumpling in on myself and shutting down.

_Warning: Emotional Overload; You Have Reached Critical Mass_

OoO

I ran and ran and ran, until I was far from the man who'd just turned my life upside down, far from the problems of my every day life...

I _was_ close to Kenny's house, though, quickly moving from a bad part of town to a worse part of town, weaving through the streets until I came across the broken down home I associated with the young blond. I crossed my arms over my chest after knocking on the door, cheeks red with cold and eyes irritated from tears. A strong wind whipped through my jacket and I shivered, looking up gratefully as Karen opened the door a crack, looking up at me just slightly.

"Firecrotch?" she asked, confused. I laughed miserably and whispered reprimandingly, "My name is Kyle, Karen. Is Kenny here?"

"Nah, he's out wit' that flowerboy, Peanut Butter or whatever." She rolled her eyes, demonstrating her disdain for her brother and his choice of friends. I scowled, at a loss as to what to do. When I'm upset, I come to Kenny for advice and-

"May I come in?" I murmured politely, "Just for a moment?"

She shrugged and stood to the side, allowing me to enter the dirty foyer, stepping over a discarded beer bottle in the hallway. Karen disappeared and that was fine with me. I knew my way around.

Kenny's room consisted of a dresser and a musty-smelling old mattress on the floor. I didn't like to go in there, but I'd known the immortal for the better part of fourteen years and I knew where he kept what I was after.

Unfortunately, though, his drawer of forbidden things was distinctly lacking in what I was after-alcohol. Stan had always joked (with a slightly uncomfortable tone that indicated he was serious) that as soon as I could legally drink, I'd become an alcoholic. Personally, I just find alcohol the best way to soothe a mind that never stops going, and right then, I'd do anything to forget the look in Cartman's eye and how betrayed and pathetic I felt.

Perhaps that's why I picked it up-the fake ID Kenny had made for me months ago that I refused to take. It had my school picture from last year, my name, my age-twenty-two. I thought it was a bit of a stretch, really, which is one of the reasons I didn't take it-the other being that I didn't need something like this to go on my permanent record.

... Whatever. Checking my pocket to make sure I had my wallet, I pocketed the ID and, urged by strange noises coming from Kevin's room, made haste leaving the broken home, heading down the abandoned street towards downtown South Park, a dangerous place filled with seedy bars and seedy people. I've never been there alone, but I figured I'd be fine-who would bother _me_?

OoO

"_On va chez toi ou chez moi?_" the phrase came whispered into my ear. I jumped a little, shivering, spinning in my chair to see a tall, scruffy man with overlong, wild brown hair falling past his shoulders, a three day beard covering his neck, cheeks and chin and a cigarette dangling from his lips. "E-excuse me?" I stammered as the man leaned in closer, too close for comfort.

"_Bonsoir, chaton._" he smirked, sitting heavily into the chair beside mine. "_Vous êtes perdu?_"

_'Did he just call me a kitten?'_I wondered inwardly, realizing belatedly that I was being hit on. I blushed shyly on reflex and asked sheepishly, "Do you speak English?"

The man blinked once, twice. He shook his head as though to clear it. "_¿Dónde estoy?_ Wait, zat's _español_, isn't eet, dearie? Where am I?" He spoke with a heavy French accent that I couldn't help but think rather endearing. I smiled, glancing down into the bitter amber liquid halfway filling my glass and then around the surprisingly quiet bar. "You're in South Park, South Park, Colorado."

"I'm een _Amérique_?" He seemed utterly perplexed for a couple seconds, before he visibly clicked into the universal, "Oh, yeah!" expression and relaxed. "_Oui_, I remember now. South Park, Hm?"

Suddenly, his eyes sparked with interest and he leaned in entirely too close (in my opinion, anyway), examining me like a particularly interesting specimen under a microscope.

"You are... Kyle Broflovski, _non_?" he inquired slowly. I nodded slowly, trying to think of where I'd seen the man's face before... He _did _seem familiar...

The man's cold brown eyes softened and suddenly, I remembered a little boy dying in my arms, an angry boy with an issue with God, a boy who called himself-"Mole?"

The brunette lunged at me and I just barely managed to set my second beer on the counter before I was swept up into the man's arms, hefted easily off my chair and into the air. His arms, strong and solid around the my admittedly delicate waist, tightened until his hold was almost painful. The mercenary's chest rumbled with a delighted laugh and I couldn't help but smile again, gently patting the man on the back.

"It's been a while." I murmured as I was sat back down on my stool, remembering the Canadian American War with a bittersweet crooked smirk. Christophe grinned wildly down at me and slowly lowered himself to his seat as well, suddenly seeming less calm and suave and more antsy and overexcited. "_Mon dieu_... Eet 'as been... Years. _Si longtemps_..."

"It's been a while since you were in the states, hasn't it?" I questioned curiously, noting that his accent was heavier and his English a bit worse since when he was a kid. He nodded approvingly. "_Oui_, very perceptive. I 'ave mostly been een France for ze last seven years. Spent some time een _España_, but mostly in France."

"Why are you here now, Christophe?"

"Ah... Per'aps I will tell you some ozer time, _mon cherí._" he rushed out, suddenly awfully distracted as he stared past me and out the window at the front of the bar, into the night. I twisted in his seat to try and see what he saw, but the man caught my jaw in a vice grip as he stood, tilting my face up to the light. The mercenary practically devoured my face with his eyes, flicking quickly over my bright green eyes and pale skin splattered with freckles. He leaned way down, brushing his beard across my cheek as he whispered ominously in my ear, "Don't hang out een places like zis. Eet ees much 'oo dangerous, _chaton_."

In an instant he was walking away, a shovel in his hand that I hadn't noticed before. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the bartender flinch. _Guess he didn't notice either._

"_Je vais vous voir bientôt._" he called over his shoulder. I figured it meant something along the lines of goodbye and smiled, calling back a reflecting farewell a moment too late.

OoO

_Finally, Christophe! Oh, I'm so excited. And if you want me to update soon..._

_**QUESTIONS, COMMENTS, CONCERNS? REVIEW!**_


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